Right to freedom of speech or duty to weigh what you say?

It is a string of about 100 words that is now tied around the neck of noted sociologist Ashis Nandy like an albatross. With the way things have shaped up for him, he seems eternally doomed to bear his cross of intellectual discourse that he delivered at the Jaipur Literature Festival on January 26.

I wasn’t present at the session where Nandy put forth his words that screamed without his permission, but I quote from a newspaper copy that published the transcript of that session, ‘Republic of Ideas’, featuring quite a distinguished panel.

Nandy’s statement begins as a reply to something that Tarun Tejpal says. To quote Nandy: ‘Just as a response to this part, very briefly, he’s not saying the most important part of the story, which will shock you, and it will be a very undignified and — how should I put it — almost vulgar statement on my part. It is a fact that most of the corrupt come from the OBCs (Other Backward Classes)and the scheduled castes and now increasingly scheduled tribes and as long as this is the case, Indian republic will survive…’

Now, he did say that. And to be fair, he did apologise, even if sounding as if he was doing a favour. In a statement, he ends his apology thus: ‘… I hope this will be the end of the matter. I’m sorry if some have misunderstood me. Though there was no reason to do so…’ (Nobody has any right to misunderstand him, you get it!)

But I’m not using this space to do some more hair-splitting on the issue that the intellectual class and their opponents are milking as best as they can till the next controversy hits the television channels with equal ferocity.

To cite the Constitution of India, Nandy has the freedom of speech and he can say what germinates in his mind. But common sense demands that you weigh what you say. Hindi, my mother tongue, has many proverbs underpinning the importance of caution in speech and I’m sure all other languages have the same. (As an aside, I guess there is something about the platform of the Jaipur Literature Festival — it inspires speech that immediately gets construed by a certain section of the society as incendiary.)

Whether Nandy should have been more discreet is also not the crux of this blog. It’s about the genetic make-up of the ruling class — of which intellectuals become an integral part even if they are not members of the Parliament or hold ministerial posts. The haves, most of whom are the rulers, have some extra element in their double-helix DNA that gives them an unconscious right to talk down to the rest of the society. Their forefathers gave themselves the right to be patronizing — even insulting and hurtful — to the underprivileged fellow citizens and they only perpetuate that entitlement. They can hail an achiever from a lower rung of the society by celebrating the success in a manner which reminds everybody that their great grandfathers had accomplished the same 300 years ago.

This immediately reminds me of the Criminal Tribes Act of 1871, which the then rulers used to notify nomadic cattle grazers, wandering singers, acrobats and other categories of citizens as hereditary criminals — only criminals would live in forests which these people did, so they were criminals. Until 1944, the British roped in more communities under the purview of this Act. It was only in 1952 that the stigmatized tribes were denotified by the Government of India. Writer, social activist and Magsaysay Award winner Mahashweta Devi has been a relentless crusader of the cause of the denotified tribes, whose continuing plight, however, is a different story.

What I’m trying to say is that most often, the elite talk down to the disadvantaged not explicitly to hurt but as a matter of their daily speech — they don’t realise that their speech has naturally become denigrating and hurtful over thousands of years of conditioning.

It’s going to take more than just an occasional apology to stem that attitude out of our minds and out of our speech. As far as I’m concerned, the controversy that Ashis Nandy’s remarks have generated should be viewed beyond the political issues of the day. It’s about a centuries-old habit that the privileged of our society will need more than discipline to get rid of. It’s going to take some serious restrain on the part of the advantaged to stop generalising those who have not been as fortunate as them, people who have been subjected to humiliation through centuries due to certain historical aberrations.

Our Constitution does not give us the right to misuse our speech even as it bestows on us a very delicate right called the ‘Right to freedom of speech and expression’. Even if it doesn’t mention explicitly, we are all grown-up enough to understand that it also implies we need to exercise caution when we use this very seminal right. Intellectuals and activists, you too get bracketed in this category, so please think before you raise your fist in air for an issue next time.

DISCLAIMER : Views expressed above are the author's own.

Author

Archana Khare Ghose, presently working with the Times of India, has been writing for a living for the past 13 years; she has been writing purely for pleasure for much longer than that. Her ideal day comprises a hot mug of tea by a window from where she can watch the world go by, and then write about it all. When not dreaming about her ideal day, she loves to delve into anything that has a generous sprinkling of art, culture, history, heritage, literature and the lives of people who create all of the above. 7thSense is her interpretation of the world around her.

Archana Khare Ghose, presently working with the Times of India, has been writing for a living for the past 13 years; she has been writing purely for pleasur. . .

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Author

Archana Khare Ghose, presently working with the Times of India, has been writing for a living for the past 13 years; she has been writing purely for pleasure for much longer than that. Her ideal day comprises a hot mug of tea by a window from where she can watch the world go by, and then write about it all. When not dreaming about her ideal day, she loves to delve into anything that has a generous sprinkling of art, culture, history, heritage, literature and the lives of people who create all of the above. 7thSense is her interpretation of the world around her.

Archana Khare Ghose, presently working with the Times of India, has been writing for a living for the past 13 years; she has been writing purely for pleasur. . .